Data historians provide effective decision support in near real time

Plant data historians are moving beyond their traditional
role as a tool for collecting and archiving data to better
understand past plant performance, to becoming a powerful tool
that can be used to improve real-time operations. With
increased data throughput and higher data resolutions,
historians have also become a foundation for plant asset
management initiatives, thanks to new visibility and trending
tools that can also be used to support energy management
programs. Todays historians also support techniques, such
as complex event processing, which can analyze multiple streams
of plant data in real time to identify and diagnose emerging
problems before they disrupt the production process in the
plant, or negatively affect smart grids or other distributed
assets.

Plant historians get enhanced functionality.

Recent product advances increase historian data throughput,
solution scalability, compatibility and connectivity with plant
systems and third-party solutions. They provide powerful
visualization and analytical tools. These allow users to access
and leverage huge volumes of plant data in near real time.
Historians can collect and display real-time data and events,
giving users a more comprehensive view of what is happening in
a plant or distributed assets. Powerful processing
capabilities, coupled with advanced software algorithms, have
changed how historians are used. Historians are transitioning
from their traditional role, as plant record-keepers and
planners, to tools that can have a positive impact on plant
operations in real time.

With recent advances in computing technology, including 64-bit
processing architectures, historians can collect and store
large amounts of plant and process information. Many can
archive up to several exabytes of data. Many can simultaneously
store and retrieve plant data, giving users an up-to-the-minute
view of plant performance. Todays historians can handle
hundreds of thousands of discrete events per second, so
real-time plant data is available almost immediately for
analysis. Modern computing power has enhanced historians to
such a degree that, rather than just being used to look back on
plant performance, they can be used to predict and positively
impact future performance.

The use of de facto standards and environments, such as OPC and
Microsoft .NET, allows easier interfacing between systems and
different historians. This helps users leverage existing
historian data, even if they choose a new solution from a
different vendor. OPC compatibility also enables easy access
to, and use of, data from HMI, DCS, CMMS and other plant-level
applications. Since suppliers are also beginning to offer
OPC-UA compliant products, historian data is now also readily
available to applications running on non-Microsoft platforms.
In addition to plant-level equipment, historians also interface
well with EAM, ERP and advanced optimization applications.

Historian suppliers have worked to offer improved data
access and visibility tools with their solutions. Many offer
web-based, thin-client access to historians, and most offer
access to historian data via mobile devices. Powerful trending
and graphics tools allow users to generate custom reports and
charts to visualize plant data. Suppliers have also emphasized
ease of use and configuration in their product development.
Users can easily create custom interfaces and role-based
dashboards to view and manipulate historian data.

Due to their high data capture rates, todays
historians can act as a foundation for plant asset management
programs. The ability to store, access and analyze plant data
in near real time can help users identify any anomalies or
troubling performance trends that could indicate a problem with
production equipment. Historical data can be used to develop
models or profiles that help users determine how a given asset
should behave under normal conditions, and to set alarms or
formulate maintenance strategies to balance
production needs with asset viability, remotely and in real
time. We expect historians to play a role in energy-management
initiatives as well, by helping to develop energy-consumption
models that can be used to identify under-performing and
inefficient plant equipment, or to make real-time adjustments
to production to minimize energy costs.

Coming soon: Complex event processing.

Though in its infancy, complex-event processing is another
technology that can harness the
capabilities of plant historians. Historians can be used to
complement and augment complex event processing, a technology that can analyze multiple
incoming streams of data in near real time. When viewed
individually, these streams might mean little. But when viewed
simultaneously and in context, they could help identify process
or plant equipment problems using advanced data filtering and
algorithms.

ARC analysts are following recent trends in data historians
closely. These include the evolution of many plant historians
from large-capacity historical data repositories, to real-time
decision-support and business intelligence platforms,
andultimatelyto platforms that enable real-time
operations centers functionality for a single plant or even a
set of plants. HP readers should stay tuned to this column, or
visit www.arcweb.com for details on future reports on this
important topic. HP